Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1887-11-09
PROFITABLE GUESTS.
People Whose Arrival Makes New
York Landlords Smile.
What Foreign Princes and Dignitarles
Spend When They Travel-Sarah Bern
hardt's Hotel BiIl-The Best ALI
Observation-Disclosures

r-ROund-G Guests.
The hotels of New York have never en-
tertained SO many representatives of roy
atty and nobility in one year as they have
during period dating from March 1, of
this year, to the present time, remarks q
New York writer in the Philadelphia
Press. Queen Kapiolani and her retinue,
the Prince of Siam and his following,
rich Indian Prince and the Duke of Marl-
borough have been some of the titled
guests. No first-class New York hotel has
monopoly of the patronage of nobility
and royalty, although al are eager to get
them, for they are a great advertisement.
A house on lower Fifth avenue, of modest
appearance, but eminently select as to its
guests, had the Indian Prince and the
Duke Of Marlborough among it's guests.
1t is not an expensive hotel, but it has aud
keeps run on royalty, and especially on
titled persons from Great Britain
and her provinces. An old hotel man was
asked how houses succeed first in
getting the patronage of wealthy and
royal foreigners. He replied that il il
mainly due to the influence of their valets
or servants. The valet falls in with the
purser or captain of the steamer and
captain has his favorite list of hotels whose
proprietors have not forgotten him. and
his royal passengers are pretty sure TO so
to the house that he suggests. Railroad
conductors, too, are very useful agents for
hotels, and many a conductor while in
New York gets mis- board free in consid-
Grafton that he will send distinguished
customers to the house.
But royal personages are not the most
profitable guests of the house. Your
English Lord will pay $40 a day for the
board of himself and servant at a select
hotel and think it extravagant enough.
The board bill of the Prince of Siam and
his retinue while he was in New Y Ork did
not exceed 500 day, and the Queen of the
Sandwich Islands lived on much less than
that, fact which may have been due 30
the somewhat impoverished condition of
the treasury of the kingdom.
The big hotel bills paid in New York are
from the pockets of foreigners less high in
rank than Princes or Dukes or from Ameri-
cans, who, after all, are the best patrons
Sara Bernhardt, when in New York. stops
at hotel whose best rooms cost $50 each
day. She gets suite for herself ana
apartments for her attendants and the
menagerie of animals that she has with
her. The entire cost of the lodging is
about $40 day, and OF her meals from the
hotel cafe about $25. She is not a drinker
of much expensive wine. Patti and Nico-
lima, who are high livers and drink choice
wine, pay more for their meals and less for
their apartments. A prince of hotel
patrons, however, was De Lesseps. he
and his family and servants paid, ar a
well known uptown house, the princely
sum of $500 a week. They had their own
cook in the kitchen and several attend
ants, and lived on the very top shelf An
obscure Spanish Count, of not very great
wealth or fame, was at the same hotel
prior to the coming of De Lesseps, and al
though unknown to fame on this side of
as the banner hotel custom n
by paying the princely sum of $500
per week for his entertainment. When
James McHenry, the one-time railroad
magnate, was in the zenith of his financial
power he was one of the most profitable
customers of New York hotels. He had
his valet and agent and attendants with
him. Nothing but the best suite of rooms
in house would answer his purpose, and
although light eater he was not spgring
as to the table. When the Duke Alexis
visited this country he spent money very
freely at the hotel where ne stopped. and
his taste for Russian dishes nearly drove
the chef wild. He demanded cheese and
whisky as an appetizer in the morning; (;
his tea was brewed in a samovir, accord
ing to tho Russian rule, and nothing but
the choicest champagne, of which Rus.
slams always get the best, would suit his
taste.
However, the best all-the-year-round d
guests are the Americans, and especially
fhn
profitable of these are the people on their
wedding tour. One hotel on upper Broad
way makes quite feature of entertaining
the latter class. 1t has bridal chambers
that rent for S27 day, and a good meal
in its cafe will cost the couple about
$40. Another house, farther up town,
makes a speciality of catering to
people who desire to be truly select,
and especially to elderly ladies of wealth
who desire to keep their daughters in the
choicest social atmosphere of hotel life
that money will buy. The house was
owned by man who recently gave it to
his daughter as her wedding portion, and
she draws the handsome income of s.. 600 a
month from it. Even at this enormous
rental the landlord, who died the other
day, made S1,000,0t0 out of the place. His
hobby was to keep the house select.
1t is pretty hard to find hotel in New
York that isn't making money. A land
lord of one of the latest and most expen-
sive hc'ises built in New York died the
other 1ay worth a fortune. The pro-
priet6r of the house spent more than 81,
000,DtJ0 in its construction, but il proved
so profitable from the start that it has
given him no care beyond receiving the
rent when il is brought to him. Indeed.
it is said that he has never been inside of
it.
But all the New York places that enter
tain royalty eau not boast of having with
in their walls at one time representatives
of such immense wealth as are sometimes
found of pleasant afternoon at a hoYnel,y
little inn in the outskirts OF the citv at the
head of Jerome avenue. A stranger vvoaII
pass it by as too humble for notice II
looks like an old-time tavern with stue.
coed walls. its ceilings are low and its un.
covered floors are worn. Patronize the
place and you viii be surprised 10 find
that its charges are equal TO those OF any
hrst-class hotel in New York It's cuisine.
too, is as good as any to be found in the
metropolis. There is an air about the place
Of "We don't need your patronage, but II
you are willing TO pay tae price we will
! entertain you." It is at this house that
the Vanderbilts and the millionaire road
riders have stopped ever since old Com
modore Vanderbilt began patronizing it.
William II. Vanderbilt was especially fond
of it, and he used to gather about him
there his friends and drop into conversa-
tion as he was seldom heard to do any
where else. IL was no uncommon thing to
| see representatives OF 500, ,0J0, 900 gathered
| there at one time.